National Shooting Sports Month: Why it Matters

August is here, and that means it's National Shooting Sports Month! It's a month-long recognition of the benefits of shooting sports, from sharpening marksmanship skills to the benefits for conservation. This month is a great time to not just get yourself out to the range, but to get a friend out to the range as well! Read on to find out what National Shooting Sports Month is, the NSSF's +ONE movement, finding a local shooting range, and how shooting sports benefits conservation. 

What is National Shooting Sports Month?

National Shooting Sports Month was started by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) in 2016 as a way to recognize and help grow shooting sports nationally. Its focus is to encourage marksmanship, firearms safety, and continuing the tradition of firearms ownership and recreational shooting in the United States. The NSSF encourages dealers and ranges to host events and for current shooting sports participants to take someone new to the range during August. 

+ONE Movement

The +ONE Movement is one of the main initiatives the NSSF currently uses to help grow hunting and shooting sports participation. It encourages hunters and target shooters to become mentors and take someone new out to the range, introducing these sports to new participants and helping to preserve these traditions. 

If you've been thinking about mentoring someone new to hunting or target shooting, there's no better time to start than now! Here's a few tips for getting started. 

• Start small: Whether you’re taking someone target shooting or out into the field for the first time, consider starting small and building up. Start with small caliber rifles like a .22 to teach proper fundamentals and technique without fearing recoil or start with small game hunting to teach woodsmanship fundamentals on a lower pressure hunt.  
• Forget the bullseye: Success matters, even to new target shooters, but there are also different ways to define success. Instead of focusing on printing small groups right on the bullseye, try shooting fun reactive targets like water bottles, clay pigeons, or steel spinners, where the fun is in hitting the target rather than a small group size. 
• Make connections: Hunting and target shooting are fun but connecting them to other parts of a new participant’s life can help make them more meaningful. If you’re taking out a new hunter, find a new wild game recipe for the two of you to try with your harvest. The field to table experience helps bring a deeper connection to the hunt and adds even more to the learning experience.  

Where to Shoot

Want to get out to the range for National Shooting Sports Month but you're struggling to find a place to shoot?  The Where to Shoot app is a great resource for finding a range near you. The app shows multiple types of ranges near your location, including state wildlife agency ranges, local gun clubs, and private retail ranges. You can filter for ranges by different types of shooting, so you don't end up at the trap range trying to sight in your new precision rifle.  

How Shooting Sports Benefits Conservation

One of the most important pieces of shooting sports participation, and a key reminder of why National Shooting Sports Month is important, is the impacts shooting sports has on conservation. Here are just a few ways that shooting sports benefit conservation. 

Conservation Funding 

Target shooters are the largest funders of conservation through funding raised from the Pittman Robertson Act. Their purchases of firearms and ammo help fund conservation projects for state wildlife agencies, including acquiring public lands, implementing hunter education programs, and building and improving public shooting ranges. Growing shooting sports participation means more conservation funding, which helps all hunters and target shooters. 

Improving Skills

Regular target shooting participation also helps improve marksmanship skills, which is critically important out in the field. Improving your fundamentals on the range helps make your technique repeatable when the adrenaline starts flowing in the field. Having solid fundamentals that you can rely on in the field helps you make more clean, ethical shots, ultimately leading to more successful hunts. So don't just shoot a couple times per year, get out to the range regularly to practice and keep those skills sharp! 

Pathway to Hunting

For many, target shooting and shooting sports competitions can become a pathway to hunting. Many shooting sports disciplines like clay shooting, NRL Hunter, and more imitate hunting scenarios. For many participants, hunting becomes the natural next step to applying the skills learned in target shooting and competitive shooting disciplines. Many target shooters are also introduced to hunting by friends who shoot with them, and these friends can act as mentors to help answer their hunting questions and take them on their first hunting adventure. 

National Shooting Sports Month is an important reminder of the role shooting sports and target shooting plays. Target shooters and competitive shooters help raise significant funding every year for public lands, hunter education, and shooting range development that benefit all hunters and target shooters. Shooting sports participation also helps build your skills for the field, and can lead to even more hunters taking to the woods and sharing in the traditions we all enjoy. So, if you know someone who's interesting in shooting, get them out to the range this month! One trip may just light the spark that creates a lifelong passion.